Practicing the Bible is a Crime in Finland

Date December 20, 2007 Posted by Roger Overton

This was posted on the CBMW blog last week, but it's important enough to highlight even if I'm a bit late…

“A pastor in Finland and two of his evangelical colleagues are suffering
the consequences of obeying the Bible's injunction that forbids female
pastors in an egregious violation of the separation of church and
state.


A Finnish district court last week convicted and fined Ari Norro, a
preacher in the Luther state church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of
Finland (ELCF), with criminal discrimination for refusing to conduct a
worship service with a female pastor, according to a Christianity Today report. 


Norro was fined the equivalent of 20 days of his salary, according to
CT. Acting vicar Tauno Tuominen and Pirkko Ojala, chairman of the
Lutheran Evangelical Association of Finland, were also found guilty of
similar charges and fined. All three men will now have a criminal
record.


The case first unfolded in March when Norro was scheduled to preach at
a Sunday morning communion service in southern Finland. Fifteen minutes
before the service, female preacher Petra Pohjanraito arrived to serve
at the altar. Norro offered to leave the church, but Pohjanraito chose
to leave instead. A church council requested a police investigation
into the matter, leading to charges against Norro, Tuominen and Ojala.


Finland's laws prohibit any discrimination either in the workplace or
in public based on race, language, age, family ties, health, religion,
political orientation, work, sexual orientation, or gender.”

For the rest of the post, go here.

CBMW is an outstanding ministry, and donations count for double right now. After you're done buying everyone gift cards for Christmas (really, who wants anything else?), consider sending some money to CBMW during their matching grant opportunity:

“Through December 31, two generous individuals have agreed to match every contribution to CBMW up to $10,000. If you are able to give this month, your $50 gift will become $100, or $500 will become $1,000, and so forth to serve churches on gender issues.


Our goal at CBMW is to make high-quality Biblical resources available for free
to persuade and encourage believers around the world. We are grateful
to God for healthy churches and individuals who kindly donate to make
this ministry possible.”

Related posts:

  1. Practicing Humility
  2. Interview with Mary Kassian - Part II
  3. On the Equality and Inequality of the Genders
  4. The Role of the Bible in Evangelism, Pt 1
  5. Could God Blogs Bring Men Back Into the Church?
  6. EFBT: Complementarian Motivation

Category Posted in Culture, Gender Issues, Main Page, Roger's Posts

One Response to “Practicing the Bible is a Crime in Finland”

  1. Anonymous said:

    December 20th, 2007 at 8:46 am

    This is extremely troubling, but does Finland have the separation of church and state? The article calls the ELCF the “state church” of Finland. If that's the case, then Finnish Lutheran pastors can't expect the same legal protections that American pastors can. Note that it was church council - a group from his own church! - that requested the police to investigate.

Leave a Reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.